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PoliGAF 2017 |OT1| From Russia with Love

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If it were an actual fight to the death it would have to be Duterte. Dude seems like he'd bite your face off he had to.

In a straight-up fight, sure, Jong-un and Trump are two of the softest men alive and have no physical fitness, Duterte has actually murdered people personally.

But they are leaders of states right now and there's state power to think of.

Bannon will be fired in 2017, that's my prediction for this year.

I also predict that Trump will purpose a land invasion of Russia by 2018.
 
And second, when Trump grows angry, he will usually want the strongest response possible, unless he is told no, and that he will often govern or make decisions based off news coverage.



One person who frequently talks to Trump said aides have to push back privately against his worst impulses in the White House, like the news conference idea, and have to control information that may infuriate him. He gets bored and likes to watch TV, this person said, so it is important to minimize that.

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/donald-trump-campaign-habits-234014
 

Barzul

Member
Maybe Kasich should've said yes to that deal. I'd rather have had him than Pence at this point. Pence seems to have zero influence on Trump.
 

Ether_Snake

安安安安安安安安安安安安安安安
So the Ney York post is saying that Caroline Kennedy is going to return to politics and run for the Senate.

No idea who she is but I'm going to assume some democrats are thinking they need a Kennedy in 2020?

Maybe Kasich should've said yes to that deal. I'd rather have had him than Pence at this point. Pence seems to have zero influence on Trump.

Remember was people here kept saying Pence was going to run everything after Trump won? That didn't last long.
 

B-Dubs

No Scrubs
So the New York post is saying that Caroline Kennedy is going to return to politics and run for the Senate.

Where would she run? I could see her run for a congressional seat here, but NY already has two very well like Democratic Senators.

Also I disagree with the title of their article, everyone knows Kirsten Gillibrand is the baggage-free Hillary Clinton.

No idea who she is but I'm going to assume some democrats are thinking they need a Kennedy in 2020?

She was Obama's ambassador to Japan and is a fairly decent poet. She's also pretty awesome in general. We all thought she'd go for what is now Gillibrand's seat when Clinton vacated it to take the job at State. I don't see her primaring anyone though.
 

Metaphoreus

This is semantics, and nothing more

CTRL+F "girlfriend." Nope. Nothing. Try again?

(But this time, maybe it would help you to understand that fairly describing the views of a group is not an endorsement of those views. In fact, this might help you with your own posts! Free advice, friend.)

Hillary won it by 3 million votes; but GOP fuckery, voter suppression and disinformation crowned the victor to Fuckface Von Clownstck.

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, not the election.
 
No idea who she is but I'm going to assume some democrats are thinking they need a Kennedy in 2020?

Shes JFKs daughter. The article suggests she would go after one of the two Senate seats in NY. Again, this is a NY Post article so who knows. She has been recalled from Japan, though.
 
CTRL+F "girlfriend." Nope. Nothing. Try again?

(But this time, maybe it would help you to understand that fairly describing the views of a group is not an endorsement of those views. In fact, this might help you with your own posts! Free advice, friend.)



Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, not the election.

Do you consider aborting a fetus at four weeks as murder.

And doesn't this mean that you think that all pro-lifers consider my girlfriend a murderer?

I mean, then white evangelicals are the most hateful group in America.

Implications actually exist.
 

B-Dubs

No Scrubs
Shes JFKs daughter. The article suggests she would go after one of the two Senate seats in NY. Again, this is a NY Post article so who knows. She has been recalled from Japan, though.

I mean, she's generally well liked in the state and we all figured she'd go for Clinton's seat when she left for State. I'm not sure she's popular enough to primary Gillibrand at this point, I could see her taking the congressional seat in her district though.
 
If the crowds reached the Washington Monument during Trump's speech, shouldn't it be relatively easy for Trump's people to find a photo of it and blast it everywhere? Regardless of the approval ratings of Trump and the media (and whether this strategy is "brilliant" by Trump), are we assuming that people's critical thinking skills are low enough to not recognize that Trump is clearly the one lying here if his people can't produce photographic proof of his claim?
I don't understand why nobody from the Trumper camp hasn't done this already. We already have 'shops to joke that the white areas are where the KKK in their robes are. It only takes one false picture to circulate on Facebook to allow conservatives to let themselves off the hook for their disbelief.
Probably a trap.

Wikileaks wants people to give them the tax returns so that they can remove any connections with Russia like they did when they leaked documents on Assad.
Same for tax returns. Have you seen some of the obvious fakes that conservatives unquestioningly produce when you ask to see Obama's Kenyan birth certificates?
"Trained" is the operative word there. I totally agree with you, but that comment was directed at the assertion of "what can you do with a high school diploma?" Adding training on top of that removes you from the groups that this election typically talks about. The people that are really going to have to adapt or die are the people that don't even want to go back and get tech certs and stuff like that. These are the people that basically want a unicorn.
Sen. Robert Byrd (DKKK) brought the FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services Division to West Virginia and created thousands of jobs, both in relocating workers and training locals, and revitalized struggling communities.
I doubt that all of those Rust Belt voters are that stubborn that they would refuse a training program if it was literally brought to their local area.
Exactly. Especially if the training is provided on-the-job.
Why would I lick a wound.
If you're actually asking, because saliva has anti-coagulant, anti-bacterial and healing properties.

Politician does political thing. Guess he failed the purity test now? Seriously though, it doesn't matter other than optics.
nonononononohellno.gif. The first and grandest opportunity to rebuke Trump, to be part of an historical moment in solidarity with the group most maligned by him, and they go to a donor retreat instead? I want to hear some apologies and regrets for that.
 
No.



No.

See how this works? Are you starting to see why you should read what people say before responding, instead of lashing out at imaginary foes?

So... you just said that pro-lifers consider abortion to be murder (as described in the post I linked to), but... people who are pro-life don't consider people who get abortions to be murderers?
 

B-Dubs

No Scrubs
Does anyone know any of Caroline Kennedy's positions?

Would she be able to take any of the populist Bernie stuff forward or is she more centrist?

If I remember right she's about where the actual Hillary Clinton is politically. So a fair bit to the left, she's not a firebrand populist if memory serves.

I don't understand what the point of Caroline primarying two popular senators would be.

This is what I don't get. It makes no sense, if she goes for a seat in the House she'd take it no issue. I think it's just the Post trying to stir shit up, the guy who wrote the article has a new book on the Kardashians to sell (it's mentioned in the last graph).
 
I know there are some people who consider women to be useful idiots to Big Abortion, but uhh, that is not the case, women have agency and understand what abortion means.

Either women who get abortions are people who did bad things or abortion is not bad.

There isn't really a way to square that circle that I've seen other than assuming that women are stupid (spoilers: they're not).
 
I know there are some people who consider women to be useful idiots to Big Abortion, but uhh, that is not the case, women have agency and understand what abortion means.

Either women who get abortions are people who did bad things or abortion is not bad.

There isn't really a way to square that circle that I've seen other than assuming that women are stupid (spoilers: they're not).
It's fascinating. Abortion is murder, but yet women who have an abortion shouldn't face the same punishments as those found guilty as murder. The conclusion is quite apparent: extremely few people truly believe abortion is murder and the sentiment comes from something completely different, such as control of women and their bodies. Which becomes even more apparent when one gets into the history of abortion and women's right and how the strong opposition to abortion really only started popping up when the discussion shifted from whether it was right for doctors to suggest abortions as medical procedures to whether or not women had the right to make that decision for themselves.
 
It's fascinating. Abortion is murder, but yet women who have an abortion shouldn't face the same punishments as those found guilty as murder. The conclusion is quite apparent: extremely few people truly believe abortion is murder and the sentiment comes from something completely different, such as control of women and their bodies. Which becomes even more apparent when one gets into the history of abortion and women's right and how the strong opposition to abortion really only started popping up when the discussion shifted from whether it was right for doctors to suggest abortions as medical procedures to whether or not women had the right to make that decision for themselves.

"There has to be some form of punishment" was actually Trump's most lucid moment of the campaign.

Trump had no opinion whatsoever about abortion (except that his mistresses should get them) prior to 2016 but read from all of the voters he needed that "abortion=bad"

And so Trump sees that if abortion is bad, then the women who get abortions must be bad because you know... that's basic common sense.

And if the women did some terrible thing, there should be some form of punishment!
 

DrForester

Kills Photobucket
C2zYqdiUkAARQi-.jpg
 
Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell ran on "Death Panels."

This is not a very great Facebook post...

I know the Tea Party types ran on "death panels", but I don't remember Ryan or McConnell running on "Death Panels".

Types like Ryan and McConnell were more about half-truths and out-of-context type Bullshit.

I think Dan Rather's strategy is dumb because Republicans are already prone to appear more on GOP friendly "news" like Fox.

But I think Trump's alt-truth strategy is a losing strategy, because he's already sitting at really bad favorables and this alt-truth shit may solidify the anti-fact nature of the deplorables, but it also will solidify the 55% who disapprove of him into hating him even more.
 
I know the Tea Party types ran on "death panels", but I don't remember Ryan or McConnell running on "Death Panels".

Types like Ryan and McConnell were more about half-truths and out-of-context type Bullshit.

I think Dan Rather's strategy is dumb because Republicans are already prone to appear more on GOP friendly "news" like Fox.

But I think Trump's alt-truth strategy is a losing strategy, because he's already sitting at really bad favorables and this alt-truth shit may solidify the anti-fact nature of the deplorables, but it also will solidify the 55% who disapprove of him into hating him even more.
Well I hope that 55% rallies behind the next candidate to take him on instead of sitting on their hands and whining about the lesser of two evils.

And votes in the midterm elections for people who are against Trump (aka Democrats, not "good Republicans" who support 98% of his platform anyway).

Like fuck, man. I like what I'm seeing in the activism and the marches et al but I don't think I will ever stop being so jaded about this election. How did we fuck this up this badly? "Didn't visit Wisconsin and Michigan" would be a fine topic to sit around and discuss over tea against a Kasich or a Bush, but the fact that enough white Midwesterner hicks were hoodwinked by this psychotic manchild is pathetic.
 

UberTag

Member
nonononononohellno.gif. The first and grandest opportunity to rebuke Trump, to be part of an historical moment in solidarity with the group most maligned by him, and they go to a donor retreat instead? I want to hear some apologies and regrets for that.
Clearly the Democrats had other priorities.

I mean, let's be real here... while the "both sides are the same" rhetoric is complete nonsense, let's not paint the Democrats as angels here. They're pretty shitty. It's just that pretty shitty would be a welcome alternative to what Trump brings to the table.

The fact that 6 out of the 7 DNC chair hopefuls took a vacation while the rest of the world rose up to combat Trump head on should not fall on deaf ears.
If anything, it should tell us that we need some additional chair hopefuls beyond that sorry lot.
 

PKrockin

Member
Well I hope that 55% rallies behind the next candidate to take him on instead of sitting on their hands and whining about the lesser of two evils.

And votes in the midterm elections for people who are against Trump (aka Democrats, not "good Republicans" who support 98% of his platform anyway).

Like fuck, man. I like what I'm seeing in the activism and the marches et al but I don't think I will ever stop being so jaded about this election. How did we fuck this up this badly? "Didn't visit Wisconsin and Michigan" would be a fine topic to sit around and discuss over tea against a Kasich or a Bush, but the fact that enough white Midwesterner hicks were hoodwinked by this psychotic manchild is pathetic.
How much can actually be accomplished in 2018, given that there appear to be three times as many Democratic senate seats up for reelection as Republican?
 
The whole "I want to vote for someone, not against" is sort of interesting in light of the idea of voting being an irrational behavior without other benefits than the actual utility of the vote (which is negligible). Most liberal democracies avoid this problem by instilling good civic feelings about voting to make people enjoy the process of voting, but it isn't too surprising turnout (especially given the restrictive voting laws in most of the US) would drop for a "lesser of two evils" candidate. Since all of the utility of voting comes from the good feeling it gives you, the cost/benefit analysis is going to be worse if it's relatively difficult to vote and you don't even like the candidate.

Of course, voting against Trump and for (who should have been) the first woman president *did* give me a feeling of civic satisfaction but especially outside of swing states I can get why it's a real issue and I don't think blaming voters is the correct response. It's one massive collective action problem that is mostly fixed by giving voters fuzzy feelings about how great it feels to vote, which is important if you're going to stand in line for an hour after work.

How much can actually be accomplished in 2018, given that there appear to be three times as many Democratic senate seats up for reelection as Republican?
Defending all the seats of the 2006 wave combined with taking Nevada and Arizona's senate seats would be a big accomplishment, but that aside there's a ton of competitive gubernatorial and state legislature races combined with trying to win back as much of the House as possible.
 

Crocodile

Member
I called my Senator again yesterday and left a message. I have no idea how much good it will do but its automatically better than doing nothing :p

I'm still shook we had a press statement yesterday about FUCKING CROWD SIZES

How much can actually be accomplished in 2018, given that there appear to be three times as many Democratic senate seats up for reelection as Republican?

Snap up Governor's Mansions (A LOT of them are up for grabs) + make headway into the House and maybe reclaim it + make headway into state legislatures. Defending the Senate is an important goal but there are other things at stake and other ways progress can be made.
 
How much can actually be accomplished in 2018, given that there appear to be three times as many Democratic senate seats up for reelection as Republican?
1) Swinging every governorship we can (7 R-held Clinton states, AZ/FL/MI/WI which were close as well)

2) Winning the House (still a long shot unless Trump reeeeally fucks up)

3) Holding our vulnerable Dem-held Senate seats (the Romney five - ND, MT, MO, WV and IN - I'm also concerned about WI, OH and FL. PA and MI I'm less worried about). We could also gain two - AZ and NV. Best case scenario is a 50-50 tie, which still gives the GOP practical control, but I'd still take it.

4) Flipping state legislatures (some are heavily gerrymandered, but like with the House, could go in a big anti-Trump wave)

5) Ballot initiatives (fair redistricting rules, marijuana etc)
 
How much can actually be accomplished in 2018, given that there appear to be three times as many Democratic senate seats up for reelection as Republican?

If we win a D+8 generic ballot, then we'll win back the House and stop Trump from making legislation for the next two years.

2) Winning the House (still a long shot unless Trump reeeeally fucks up)

If we don't win the House in 2018, we'll never win it in the next 14 years, so, uhh...

We definitely can win this if Trump falls to 30% approval and I believe that the CNN watcher in chief will fall ten points from the high point of his presidential approval.
 

FyreWulff

Member
How much can actually be accomplished in 2018, given that there appear to be three times as many Democratic senate seats up for reelection as Republican?

start taking local seats and House seats as much as possible. Dems need to win more than the Presidency, or at least force the Republicans to cross the aisle to get more votes.
 
If we don't win the House in 2018, we'll never win it in the next 14 years, so, uhh...
What? Long term prospects of winning the House depend far more on the governor's races.

The House elections from 2022-2030 will be held under completely different maps, and those are usually drawn by the state legislatures with governor approval.

Even if we lose the House in 2018, if we sweep the governor's races that gives us considerable sway over the next round of redistricting.

Best case timeline:

2018: Dems win House, tie Senate
2020: Dems win WH/Senate
2022: Fair House maps and a stacked map against the GOP in the Senate blunt midterm backlash; Kennedy, Breyer and Ginsburg manage to hold out long enough to be replaced by Democratic appointments

Should we come out of the 2020 election with a trifecta I'd also say that's the time to get rid of the filibuster and go nuts with passing stuff.
 

FyreWulff

Member
Filibuster ain't going anywhere, because one side knows they need it later.

What they DO need to do is get rid of the stupid non-filibuster filibuster that currently exists. Should actually have to go on the floor and put your name out there instead of this silent hold shit, or just using up existing speaking time.
 
We're not going to be winning back state legislatures to get better maps if we can't even get a D+8 result in a year where the president will have an alltime low midterm approval rating.
 

mo60

Member
If we win a D+8 generic ballot, then we'll win back the House and stop Trump from making legislation for the next two years.



If we don't win the House in 2018, we'll never win it in the next 14 years, so, uhh...

We definitely can win this if Trump falls to 30% approval and I believe that the CNN watcher in chief will fall ten points from the high point of his presidential approval.

Harry Enten said a day or so ago that if trump approval rating stays around what it is now or decreases the republicans can lose 36 or more seats in 2018 in the house.
 
We're not going to be winning back state legislatures to get better maps if we can't even get a D+8 result in a year where the president will have an alltime low midterm approval rating.
I'd say the bar for picking up key governor's offices is considerably lower than for winning the House.

D+5, say would probably be enough momentum to win the major tossup states while falling short of the House. And the governor's offices give us veto power over maps even if we can't draw them (which would punt it to the courts who generally draw up neutralish maps).

I also wouldn't treat D+8 as an ironclad rule either. We could spread ourselves out just enough to win 24 squeakers on a D+5 night or be very inefficiently concentrated on a D+12 night where all the extra votes come from Nancy Pelosi's district, in addition to the fact that the districts are no less gerrymandered than they've been in the last three elections.

Should be a test to how well the GOP's gerrymanders can stand up against a Dem wave. Downballot we've only seen a great GOP year, an okay GOP year and an okay Dem year with these House maps.

Thinking about how Dems spent the last two midterms hoping against hope that the people who turned out only for Obama would show, and they didn't. Hope that holds true for the people Trump motivated.
 

Pixieking

Banned
Thinking about how Dems spent the last two midterms hoping against hope that the people who turned out only for Obama would show, and they didn't. Hope that holds true for the people Trump motivated.

Depends upon who they are. The out-and-out racists and Nazis will show and vote R because that's what they do. Same with White Evangelicals. But the genuine economic anxiety voters won't be feeling any better by the mid-terms, so they'll either sit at home, or vote D. And I think the disgust that Trump and his administration will provoke will motivate a lot of anti-Trump voters. I mean, I know I'm in a bubble of sorts, but the disgust and mockery shown towards Trump and Spicer already is pretty damning - if the Dems can continue to fan those flames from the sidelines, they'll harness the voters for sure in '18.

Plus, Richard Spencer getting punched is shitting-up Twitter and Facebook timelines something rotten - I can't imagine that helps Trump and the GOP.
 
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